U.N. Useless, Toothless, Again

Human rights groups have decried the religious/ethnic/racial cleansing going in in Darfur, Sudan as the worst humanitarian rights disaster in the world today.

The U.S. has been pressing hard for months for sanctions against the Sudanese government which has been backing the Arab Muslim Janjaweed militias responsible for this genocide (and the U.S. Congress has officially used the word genocide to describe it.)

The British government, yet again a paragon of reason on foreign policy issues, has backed the U.S. effrots and even offered troops to help avert a total catastrophe.

France, as I've already blogged previously, has been standing in the way, and speculation has it that this is because it's own TotalFinaElf has the largest oil concession in Sudan.

Now, press reports indicate that the U.S. was forced to drop the word sanctions from its proposed U.N. resolution because Arab countries on the Security Council want to give the Janjaweed--oops, sorry, the Sudanese government--more time to finish what they've started--oops, sorry, to implement their promises.

In what way is more toothless verbiage going to help the huge number of refugees created by the Janjaweed-Sudan government axis? In what way will it prevent more murders and rapes by the state-backed Janjaweed?

In what way is the U.N. useful?

What has it done for humanity, lately?

In what way is it even "United" at all? Certainly not in a desire to foster democracy and human liberty.